a life filled with laughter

well, here it is... the end of the day on july 15th, 2011. isaac was born on the 15th of june... that would make him a month old today. {this last wednesday was his four-week-old birthday.} i thought of posting that day, as well... just never got around to it. and today's post was supposed to be done a lot sooner than 11 p.m.

however, today was my most difficult day with isaac since he has been born. he is normally such a pleasant baby-boy. but for some reason that i have not quite figured out yet, he was extremely fussy today. crying quite a bit... even screaming from time to time. and just generally unhappy a good part of the day. he is usually so calm and content a good 95% of each day.

anyway, as you can imagine, blogging was the last thing on my mind today. but since it is his one-month birthday, i wanted to launch my new blog {a sort of diary of my life with isaac in it}, and i also wanted to write about it {or announce it} today on this blog.

as i have mentioned before, isaac means "laughter", so i named the blog a life filled with laughter. it's  not necessarily meant to be a photography blog, but rather a place to record all the many ways that isaac fills my life with joy and laughter... even the less than joyful moments. it'll just be a place to write about my daily interactions with him. but since i do love to take photos, i'm sure many pictures of isaac or isaac-related things will be on it, too.

i'm hoping to make it a "short-but-sweet posts" sort of place... not so wordy, as i tend to be on this blog. we'll see how that goes.

perhaps it's a good thing i started the blog at the end of this day. he is sleeping peacefully right now {a true miracle after the kind of day we had}, so maybe it is better that i write now and start things off on a good note... rather than starting it at the beginning of this day as things were just starting to go south.

why is it so often that when it rains, it pours? it's not just today that seemed to go awry... this has been one of the most difficult weeks of my entire life. i can't even begin to tell you all that entered in to cause me to say that... money problems, loss of electricity for two-and-a-half days {which caused us to lose an entire refrigerator and freezer of food and disrupted so many patterns and schedules i was just getting isaac used to}, some other issues with isaac... and so many more mini-hardships, that i can't even list all of them. and on top of it all, i had to cope with it on very little sleep. anyone who deals with little sleep on a regular basis can relate. so much of what i faced this week would have been difficult as is. but going through it in a sleep-deprived state only exacerbates each situation. i'm beyond exhausted, mentally, physically and emotionally.

{side note: notice the pacifier in isaac's mouth. we tried very much not to give him one of these. and in the first three+ weeks, we did not need to. but we gave in this week. that's all i'm gonna say... you can guess how crazy things must have gotten for me to get to the point of giving in and giving him the pacifier.}

needless to say, i'm so ready for this week to be over. the only thing is, i am about to enter another week that is bound to be almost equally difficult {for various reasons}. but this time, at least i am going into it aware that it might be trying. that's the one plus that might make things easier.

all i know is, when life is hard, it's so good to look over and see this little peanut sleeping, or cooing, or looking around observantly... even crying {i have to admit, he's adorable when he cries}. but best of all, it's awesome to see him smile. one of the bright spots about this past week is that b. and i got our first real smile from isaac {not just a gas smile}. you just know when it's the real thing, because it looks so much different than a gas smile. he was in my lap sort of inclined, and b. was sitting next to me on the couch. he looked up at us as we played with him and sang to him. then he smiled back at us... a nice big open, broad smile with wide eyes that lasted a while. IT WAS THE VERY BEST!

anyway, we so look forward to hearing that first laugh. he's already made us laugh plenty. i can't wait for the day that the tables are turned and i hear that sound from him. and when i do hear it, you can bet i will write about in on the new blog... if i have time, that is.

{by the way... the blog is a work in progress... so it is not yet visually set up how i want it to be. but it will get there evenutally.}